


Five Things Bill Noticed About Sirius, and One He Didn't (Until It Was Almost Too Late)

by gonergone



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M, five things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-06
Updated: 2015-04-06
Packaged: 2018-03-21 15:36:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3697646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gonergone/pseuds/gonergone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bill tends to think he’s reasonably clever, but he’s never been clever at all about this sort of thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things Bill Noticed About Sirius, and One He Didn't (Until It Was Almost Too Late)

The first thing Bill notices about Sirius – _really_ notices – are his hands. They're graceful and long-fingered, and Sirius uses them as punctuation as he talks, painting the air with small gestures and constant movement. It makes Sirius impossible to ignore, not that Bill would have done anyway. It doesn't matter if they're on opposite sides of the room; Sirius hands catch Bill's attention every time, until he's always half aware of where Sirius is and who he's talking to. At first that's all it is, an annoying speck of cognizance that Bill tries to push aside. The Order is _serious_ , Voldemort is _serious_ , and Bill isn't the type to let an attractive man distract him from the bigger picture.

Even if he has rather nice hands.

*

Sirius's laugh is the second thing Bill notices. It's surprisingly deep and full – surprising only because Bill had rather thought that the time in Azkaban would've removed the ability to laugh like that, like it was the only thing in the world. Sometimes when he looks around the room at the other Order members, the ones who survived the first fight against Voldemort, he fancies he can see the invisible scars they all still carry, even his Mum and Dad. He lays awake at night in his flat, staring at the bedroom ceiling and wondering if fear and loss will mark him, too, will change him into someone he barely recognizes. The thought of living with all the pain is almost as terrifying as dying. He's not sure anymore which he'd rather have happen, not to himself, but Sirius's laugh is reassuring, a steadfast refusal to give in to fear. At least, that's how Bill chooses to see it; he doubts Sirius even realizes he's doing it. 

He starts listening for that laugh in the Order meetings and at dinner, and every time he hears it he smiles. He can't help it. It helps break up the monotony of the meetings. Bill supposes the meetings aren't really as interminable as they seem sometimes, but the reality of secret society meetings is actually far more mundane than what he'd been expecting when he joined the Order in the first place. Like a child, he thought it would all be full of secret plots and exciting missions, but it's mostly petty arguments and jostling for position, half the Order trying to get Dumbledore's attention at once. Even guard duty is dull, not that he'd mention that to anyone. Any sense that he was risking his life and being a bit of a hero was washed right out the first night he sat in the dreary Ministry corridor, huddled under the invisibility cloak with nothing to do but count stones in the floor until his shift was over. 

He chastises himself that at least he can go to the Ministry, at least he can feel useful that way. He sees Sirius's face every time Ministry shifts and other assignments are handed down, the naked disappointment and frustration. Bill wonders sometimes how anyone, ever, could have remotely suspected Sirius of being a spy, given how the man's every emotion is visible on his face. It would be funny if it weren't so, well, serious. 

He wishes there were something he could do.

*

The third thing Bill notices is the way Sirius remembers everything. Well, not _everything_ , obviously, that really would be something, but he remembers how Bill likes his tea, and whether Tonks likes marmalade or butter on her toast, and who likes eggs scrambled as opposed to fried. It's not much, Bill knows, but he grew up in a house where his Mum couldn't keep straight what _anyone_ liked, let alone a house full of virtual strangers, so he feels that Sirius's memory deserves some recognition. 

Bill doesn't go to Grimmauld Place much in the mornings to start, so it takes him a while to see the way that Sirius unobtrusively inserts himself into breakfast making (dinner is unquestionably the territory of Bill's Mum, and even Sirius, it seems, can't edge in). There's a casualness to breakfast he enjoys. He finds himself stopping by before work more and more often, slipping in without bothering to knock so he can chat aimlessly with his Dad and Remus or watch the twins murmur together at the end of the table over their sausages. In most ways he loves having his own flat, but he does miss having people about sometimes, and the breakfasts help ease a pang of loneliness he hadn't even realized was there.

Bill also notices that no one makes much of an effort to remember how Sirius likes his coffee, so he begins making him a cup every morning and putting it next to his elbow when Sirius is busy doing something else, watching Sirius eventually notice it and grin. That smile starts carrying Bill through his days at Gringotts – the feeling that he's able to make someone happy, even when it seems like Voldemort has thrown everything in his life into turmoil and his entire family into danger. That's worth holding onto, he thinks, even that one small thing.

*

The fourth thing Bill notices is the way that Sirius seems to be making a concerted effort to get along with Bill’s Mum – and, shockingly, she seems to be making the same effort to get along with Sirius, which Bill would never have believed if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes. It’s fairly unexpected, considering how disastrous and frosty things had turned out when Harry had arrived, but now there is a definite thawing of relations. He supposes it’s because Harry and the others have gone back to Hogwarts and there’s nothing concrete to fight over, for the most part, but that sort of thing had never stopped his Mum before, and he wouldn’t have thought it would stop Sirius. (Part of the problem, he thinks privately, is that they’re too much alike in some ways, but it’s more than his life’s worth to risk mentioning that.) 

He watches Sirius make an extra mug of tea and hand it – while smiling – to his Mum as soon as she comes into the kitchen, and watches her thank Sirius warmly for it and smile back, and wonders exactly what the hell is happening. It's such a small things, really, but it's huge. Bill wonders if he missed something, because as far as he knows his Mum doesn’t make this sort of effort for anyone other than family, and Sirius has been firmly in the Not Family column since day one. 

It’s a mystery.

*

The fifth and most important thing Bill notices – and really, it's completely ridiculous that it takes him this long, Bill's supposed to be _clever_ – is that Sirius always seems to end up sitting beside him at the interminable Order meetings and at dinner afterward. It's happened so gradually that he can't even sort out when it started happening, but somehow he'd gotten used to Sirius being there: whispering sarcastic commentary to him through the meetings, both of them sniggering quietly like schoolboys; talking over the morning's Daily Prophet or about Quidditch standings at dinner. Once he notices he wonders if he should be surprised. Of course Sirius wants a friend, and Bill's a lot closer to the age Sirius probably feels before Azkaban robbed him of so many years of emotional growth than Remus is. 

He supposes he's not the only one who's a bit lonely. 

At dinner that night Sirius is sitting close enough that their shoulders brush every time they move. People are crammed in around the table, everyone talking at once, and Bill realizes he's probably happier than he's been since he first came home from Egypt. He still dreams of the desert all the time: the vast warmth during the days and the clear acres and acres of stars at night, stars more vivid than he'd ever see in England, more vivid than he had ever realized they could be. He misses it all so much, but there are more things in London, too, than just his family. He nudges Sirius lightly with his elbow, watching the blue eyes shift to him and the grin split open Sirius's face as he nudges back and reaches over Bill to stab the last bite of apple crumble from his plate.

"Thanks very much," he tells him, mouth full, eyes crinkling with mirth.

The funny thing is, when Sirius smiles at him like that, Bill is oddly incapable of doing anything but smiling back, probably more than a bit dozily. Another mystery. 

Sirius doesn’t seem at all put out about it, of course. If anything, he leans more fully into Bill’s space and stays there for the rest of dinner, chatting with Remus and Tonks across the table as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

Even after dinner, when Order members are peeling away to their own homes and for once there’s more space around the table than people, Sirius stays close enough that Bill can feel the warmth of him through their clothes. It’s harder than it should be to slide away and stand, stretching.

“Best be off.” He’s never sure why everyone always looks a little surprised when he says that, as if they’ve forgotten he has his own flat. His parents probably have, he supposes, but that doesn’t explain why Remus shoots Sirius a _look_.

It certainly doesn’t explain why Sirius follows him into the hall. “You know, you could stay, if you like,” he tells Bill, low and quiet. He licks his lips nervously and cocks his head and watches Bill with an intensity that makes Bill’s heart catch. “Just if you like.”

And it takes Bill a moment – a _long_ moment, because though he does think he’s reasonably clever, he’s never been clever at all about this sort of thing – and he blinks at Sirius in the dim light of the hall, and then blinks again, and watches Sirius’s face fall.

Sirius takes a step back, flashing Bill a brittle smile that might fool someone who didn’t know him as well, who didn’t notice everything about him, and Bill has to reach forward and grab his arm before he walks away.

“I think,” he says, “I would like to stay very much.”

Then they’re both smiling – grinning really – and he’s not entirely sure they’ll be able to stop.


End file.
